As we all know, the Arab world is pretty reticent when it comes to discussing the private wealth of prominent families and individuals. By all means drive a fleet of $2m supercars, just don’t tell anyone how much you’ve got in the bank — or how you got it. And at the heart of this Arabic ‘omerta’ is Saudi Arabia: the Gulf’s biggest economy, but also its most opaque.
Click here to view the Saudi Arabia’s Top 50 Rich List>>
Still, there’s nothing like a challenge, and so we’ve spent four months trawling everything from stock listings and share disclosures to luxury yachting sites, compiling hard data on over 300 families and individuals.
The Arabian BusinessSaudi Rich List 2009 is the most comprehensive study of the finances of the Kingdom’s rich elite ever published.
We’ve had people on the ground in Saudi doing just about everything but rooting through bins looking for receipts.
Cash holdings, property values, and individual assets have all been thrown into the mix. Got six Knightsbridge townhouses? You may have suffered in London’s real estate downturn, but you’re still worth a bit of money on today’s market. So your mega-yacht has a helipad (obviously), but also a sandy ‘beach’ that deploys on demand from its side wherever you are in the world? That’s worth a few dollars more.
We’ve had hiccups, too. The time a researcher elected to find out whether one company founder was still alive, by phoning his office direct and posing the question. Something was lost in translation; panic ensued when his long-suffering secretary got the wrong end of the stick and thought we were calling to inform them of his demise.
We know there will be omissions; we know that chances are we’ll have overshot a couple of the valuations: that’s what comes with the territory when you try to shine a light on one of the least open economies in the world.
What we can guarantee you is an unprecedented insight into the lives — and fortunes — of some of the richest men on earth. There are the big names (the arms dealer, the kidnap victim, the Bin Ladens) but there are also those who keep their fortunes close to their chest — the ‘Leader of Businessmen’ (it sounds better in Arabic), the ‘Sheikh of Gulf Tourism’, and one family firm that dates back to 1887.
We have deliberately not included royalty, with the exception of Prince Alwaleed, given that his wealth was achieved through his business dealings.
There will no doubt be a barrage of bouquets and brickbats now that this list has been published. But then that’s what happens when you lift the veil on a society otherwise unused to the glare of publicity: with a little candour, comes a lot of controversy.
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